


Interregnum

by stuffwelike



Category: 17th Century CE RPF, Les Trois Mousquetaires | The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
Genre: Historical Accuracy, Historical Inaccuracy, M/M, Might Have Been, RPS - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-22
Updated: 2013-12-22
Packaged: 2018-01-05 14:31:22
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,111
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1095069
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stuffwelike/pseuds/stuffwelike
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When the Comte de la Fere finds an exiled Prince on his lands, he decides to do the courteous thing and offer him shelter.  This is either the worst or the best idea he's ever had, and his life has been so thoroughly disarranged that he's only sure of one thing.</p><p><i>Robert le Diable</i> is incredibly well-named.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Interregnum

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Arithanas](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Arithanas/gifts).



Spring was, universally, a time for renewal. The fresh shoots of green practically shot out of the earth, seemingly propelled by some inhuman impulse or machine, and all of God's creatures seemed in competition to see which amongst them would be the first to duplicate themselves in the age-old rituals of mating and birth. 

Athos looked out over his lands and, if not thrilled by their burgeoning freshness, was at least satisfied that everything was going well (or at least going, and going, it would seem, according to some seasonal plan that he did not care to investigate too carefully). More importantly and immediately, he was reassured once again that his roof was in no immediate danger of falling down on his head. That had been a definite concern in some previous springs, the roof tiles perhaps feeling left out of the universal drive towards growth and movement, and thus deciding instead to begin a disastrous slide towards ground level, to reacquaint themselves with their ancient sources of clay and slate.

It was a quiet life that he now lived, so different from the years before, where this time of day would have been slept away in a drunken haze, interrupted only by the rough tones of a cherished friend complaining at him for stealing all the blankets.

Now, however, his primary and perhaps only joys came from his son, a lad just turned fourteen, and, having miraculously avoided the gangling clumsiness and disproportionate growth of childhood's maturation, still as sweet-favoured as his mother had been. Of course, joy was a relative term because as children (and young men, Athos remembered, with all the attendant and bittersweet recollections that his erratic memory refused to cease providing him with, in this case those of a certain headstrong young Gascon, chafing at guard duty) would do —and Raoul was completely typical in this —getting out of chores was probably his son's primary goal for the day.

"Duty first, Raoul," Athos said, for probably the fifth time that week. Considering it was the fifth day of the week, that count was most probably inaccurate by innumerable multiplications. It was, however, the only number Athos could contemplate with any sort of approximation toward serenity. One repetition a day.

It was why he still refused to attend Mass.

"But... " Raoul began, but then appeared to think better of his initial protest, instead coming all over sly and smug. "Grimaud got another letter today... from Mousqueton. He let me read it. Would you like to know what it said?"

"And what business is it of mine what those two old dunghill cocks find worthy of wasting paper over?" Athos scowled. He really had no wish to know what the two servants found to talk about, no matter what or... who... they discussed. And if, occasionally, he wondered about the lives of Mousqueton and his marriage-enriched and once-fellow in the Musketeers , well, it was only natural to give thought to long-parted friends, wasn't it?

"It was very interesting." Raoul smirked. In this expression, as with so many others, he was wearyingly similar to every other youth of his age that Athos had been given the misfortune to meet, a terrible mixture of cockproud-surety that he was privy to some valuable information that his elders and betters would no doubt be desperate to lay hands upon, and convinced withal that only he knew its true value.

"Oh? Did they thrill you with a discussion on the price of bread and meat and how best to trick their fellow servants out of their wages at their weekly games? How fascinating," Athos gave a sigh, joining, he was well aware, every other beleaguered father in France who was blessed with a scion whose nature was terribly similar to his own youthful conviction of innate superiority to those around him. "You won't distract me, Raoul. You'd be far better off applying yourself to your duties."

"Very well, Father," Raoul said with overly-done obedience, and promptly ruined the effect (such as it had ever been) with a scowl. If the boy were indeed as well-favoured as his mother, there was no doubt that his scowls and swift changes of mood had been learned at the knee of Athos.

**

So, with his heir dispatched to give, rather than his attention to his daily performing of vague attempts at those rounds which bespoke his duties toward the estate, instead his complaints to his tutor and (if he could find him) to the as always conveniently evasive Grimaud (an act that would probably take far longer than the actual completion of his duties), Athos rode out across his estates. He did not go because he felt his presence would be beneficial. No, as a pragmatist in all things and all matters, he knew that his degree of participation was at the highest form of acceptance unwelcome, and at the least of those forms, unwanted. 

Rather, he rode out because if he had to be tormented by matters of housekeeping for any longer than thirty consecutive minutes of the day, he feared homicide might well become, while the least of his sins, certainly the most immediate.

Fortunately Bajazet, the third beast of that name, did not mind, and actually seemed to relish tearing across the landscape, barely under the control of his master. Not that Athos could not control the horrible beast, but occasionally giving it leave to madness was somewhat of a thrill for them both.

They returned, hours later, someone calmer and more in control, dust covered and a bit wind-whipped but tired enough to look forward to a good grooming (Bajazet) and a bath (Athos).

Alas, it seemed that this moment designed for the blissful contemplation of future contentment would be the sole exemplar of the day —Raoul had in fact not taken it upon himself either to search out either tutor or valet, and had instead decided himself that the vagaries of the weather, a horse, which, while a mare, was still secondary to Bajazet only in the depth to which its teeth could sink when provoked, and a discarded jacket, were in fact the order of the day.

With a sigh that boded ill toward both rider and horse when he found them, Athos set out anew.

He was quite certainly mildly annoyed, if not instantly made either concerned or in any way tending toward vengeance, when on his slow passage through one of the woodland glades that he had noticed seemed to be a development of the art-form of trapping —a form which he despised —he overheard the still-breaking tones of his son, embarked upon a declamatory and lengthy speech as to the unfairness of life, the world, and the inherent duties of the heir.

"Breeding records and crop yields, can you imagine? As if I will not have an estate manager or a secretary to deal with the more boring aspects," Raoul was in the midst of huffing out to someone that Athos did not immediately recognize. The fact that the man's back was towards him was a secondary concern, the clothes the man wore were rather too fine for most of the locals and none of them had ever troubled themselves to befriend either Athos or his son.

"But of course, and when that is your rightful place, of course you will not wish to understand one word that your estate manager says," the man replied, voice rich with amusement; and Athos, half-bridling at the insult contained within that almost-laughter, was also delighted at the sentiment, so colloquially expressed and with such light-hearted agreement. "I imagine your father sits in silence and has not one contribution to make —it is, indeed, most obvious, from the way in which you are regarded by the workers here. Should your father be involved to any degree, they would naturally expect nothing from you, far less civilities."

"Eh?" said Raoul.

"Eh nothing, child. Your father has the respect of his tenants. As the villein to those delving below him in spinney and copse and culvert, so too the lord to the tenant, so in reverse must the lord be to the king. Which would you be? Some Puritan ranter, speaking of God's equality and letting his lands, though nominally his, lie bought and sere and fallow?"

"My father does not bow his knee to anyone but God," Raoul said proudly, "And thus to no-one, since God would not demand it of him."

"And I think your father does not attend the king,then," said the amused-dark voice, "else he would know a demanding and bow before it."

"The king would not ask, I'm thinking, because of past services," Raoul replied, his face both stormy and doubtful. Understandable, Athos thought, even as he restrained a huff of annoyance, since any knowledge that Raoul might have of whatever those past services might have been had been heavily censored by himself, or dropped sparingly from the lips of Grimaud, if the man had ever so forgotten himself as to speak.

"Past services to his father, though, and so you must be speaking of the Queen Regent, to whom those services must therefore have also been rendered," the man said dryly, and a fleeting brush of suspicion crossed Athos's mind as to who this man must be, or at the very least who he was bound to.

"The King is the King," Raoul said stiffly, and the man tipped his head back so that his long curls fell over and past his shoulders, and laughed softly.

"Ah, but you know that is not true, Raoul the son of Athos. Else you would not provoke a Palatine so. To declare that to a child of winter —"

And it was that last, the _child of winter_ , not the known and yet unfamiliar word _Palatine_ that gave Athos his understanding, and with that understanding came new eyes, to see the length of leg and the breadth of shoulder; the long curls that still held within them glints of sun, as though autumn clung there; the hooded eyes and the sardonic mouth, softened for now into teasing, and the sweet-summer cleft of the chin beneath that new-bought bitterness of lip and its meeting groove.

The child of winter.

The child of the Winter Queen, son of the frost-red and dazzling Elizabeth of Bohemia, sworn to his fading and warred-upon uncle.

One of the too-many Palatine Princes.

Too dark for Charles-Louis, the fairest of all, the County and the true Palatine, who rested still, as far as Athos was aware, within his own bought and exile-reeking lands; most certainly too tall and dignified for the young and ebullient Maurice, the sea-going would-be pirate.

Of all the Bohemian heirs, of all the princes and counts and heirs of the sprawling family tree that made up the infamous Palatine brothers, this was not the County, nor was it the piratical youngest. This was the exiled Prince, this was the man whom the world had christened _Robert le Diable_ before he had even attained his sixth birthday.

Athos was, indeed, commended to Satan.

It was Rupert of the Rhine who sat upon a log, bedecked in frayed lace and old rubbed silks and a once-good cloak; and was instructing Athos's son in the degrees of landholding.

He wished the man good luck of it, since none of his own many and varied words had seemed to do anything towards teaching the lad. Raoul had his father's stubborn streak, or perhaps his mother's, as that woman had ever been as wilful as she was fair.

"I still don't see —" Raoul began to answer back.

"And that, my son, is what you have been told, in the past by me and at the moment by Prince Rupert." Athos interrupted. "You don't see, nor do you listen."

"Comte de la Fere," said Prince Rupert, inclining his head.

"My lord of Prague," Athos did not dismount.

"My lord of every exile, I think," the prince said dryly, getting to his feet. "You had heard, then?"

"Of your banishment?" Athos nodded. "Of your coming to France? No, that I did not know."

"You do now," Prince Rupert said.

"Indeed."

"Papa, can he stay?" Raoul said hurriedly. "Just until we find him an introduction to bypass the English Queen's court?"

"Just until we _what_?" Athos almost howled.

"Ah," said Prince Rupert.

"Should I have let you tell him instead?" Raoul said anxiously.

"Dear sweet queen of heaven," said Athos, all blasphemy.

"Ah," Prince Rupert said again. "Well. I would not ask for so much... munificence, but perhaps... a meal?"

It was at times like this that Athos wished for his old friends more than ever. Actually, it was at times like this that he wished his little Abbé were standing in front of him... so that he could knock him down and demand why it was that _his God_ hated Athos so.

Instead, he merely looked toward the sky, then gave a sharp nod of his head, "I suppose that would be possible."

"Papa!" Raoul protested.

"Too kind," murmured the Palatine prince.

"Come, sweet death," Athos muttered to his horse's mane.

When he discovered that Prince Rupert did, in fact, have a horse, and that said horse had been peacefully cropping grass down by the stream with Raoul's mare, and that said mare was almost certainly in season, which would be why Raoul had been asked not to take her out, he felt even more inclined towards the sweetness of death, though it was quite certainly in the cases of one renegade son, one banished prince, and two enamoured horses, as opposed to his own ending.

**

The meal was a bit strained, to say the least. Or rather, it was strained on Athos's side of the table. Raoul seemed to be victim to no strain or, in fact, restraint when it came to questioning the Prince, tales of war and travel being among his chiefest subjects.

"And, of course, Charleon was put in charge of the whole army when he was barely my age, " Raoul was bringing up one of his most cherished complaints, "But father refuses to allow me to join the troops until I'm much older."

"I led an army when I was younger still than the Charleon," Rupert said, and Athos appreciated, if his son could not, that delicate placement of _the_. Not a name, but a naming.

"As a General?" Raoul demanded.

"As a commander," Rupert agreed.

"And you won!"

"And my army won," Rupert corrected, carving himself more beef before Grimaud could step in, and then placing it, a thin sliver of translucent-pink perfection, onto Athos's plate. "I was captured."

"You —Papa, did you know —"

"Yes," Athos said quietly. "I knew."

All of Europe had known, of how the Emperor had held Rupert in quasi-bondage, offering him more and more distinctions in return for his loyalty.

Rupert had refused each and every one of them.

"But why could you not —!" Raoul was flushed with youthful passion and too much wine, Athos noted distantly, and vowed to put an end to the conversation as soon as he could. "To swear to our Holy Father —"

" _Raoul!_ " Athos had almost been enjoying his son's education of politics until then, but agree with the Protestant Monarchs and their League or not, even he knew that here a line of politesse, if nothing else, must be and should be drawn.

"But Papa, he could have sworn to the Pope —"

"And made his own father's wars a mockery?" Athos asked. "Made a nothing of his family ties and hereditary allegiances, and a lie of his own promises? I think not. No second son has that power."

"But the eldest son could," Raoul said sulkily, and Rupert went white with unmistakable rage rather than shock, and a rage barely contained, at that, and Athos knew full well that his anger was aimed at the implication that lay behind his son's careless words; that Rupert's worth in the eyes of his elder brother had not been worth so much as the tossing of a sou in the direction of Papism, that even his life, let alone his freedom, had not been worth so much.

Athos, about to ring a peal over his son's head, was forestalled by Rupert saying, his voice dark-depth still and quiet, but his colour restored, "And yet my brother retains his crown, and I am free."

"But—"

"Enough, Raoul," Athos interrupted him. "You, unfortunately, refuse to study and therefore are not qualified to have an opinion in the matter, one way or the other."

His words had the benefit of shutting the boy up, even if they also resulted in the loudest silent pout that he had ever witnessed.

"I also believe it is time for you to retire for the evening," Athos continued. "Wish his highness a good night and take yourself off."

"But—"

"Raoul!"

"Good night, your highness. Father..." Raoul gave a nod and then left the dining room. Apparently there were to be no good wishes for Athos that evening.

"I must apologise —" Athos began, and Rupert laughed, free and easy and unfeigned, those damnable curls tumbling over his shoulders once more like those of a bar-room wench.

"Ah, for what? That is what these suppers are for, not so? To let the young test their words and beliefs against those who have lived their philosophies and found them leaf-mulch in their mouths."

"You are," Athos admitted, "the first guest who could have argued with him and not been offensive."

"Palatine-reared," Rupert agreed dryly.

"Born le diable," Athos countered.

"Wearing a pleasing face?"

"One that pleases me. And —one thing more. You were kind."

"And when was that?" Rupert's sardonic mouth and the grooves beside it were heavy in the candlelight, heavy and exhausted.

"When you did not tell my son of your own," Athos said, and as Rupert, contrary to the abstemiousness he had shown during their meal, downed his glass of good wine, he refilled it without waiting for Grimaud's appearance. "You never told Raoul of what else they bargained with, those good men of the Holy Roman Empire, at the Duke Leopold's behest."

"I did not, no," Rupert said hoarsely. "How did you know? Only my brother, my little brother, only Maurice —"

"You were kind," Athos said gently. "You were tolerant and you were kind and you understood. Not in the way a man would who had younger brothers, the world knows your love for your petit frère Maurice, and his devotion to you, but this was something simpler than a blood-bond marvel, conjured out of the Bohemian winter-kingdom. I recognised it. It was because you were thinking of how you would wish a man to treat _your_ son. And the rest was an educated guess."

"My son is a bastard born," Rupert said. "He has no rights. And I had thought to acknowledge him once this war of my uncle's was done, but now that I am banished —"

"To tell the truth, the world would say that nor does my son have rights," Athos agreed. "But I decided I should give him some, and damn the world's decrees."

"That is somewhat more difficult for me, being damned myself by those decrees, already," Rupert pointed out.

"It is, of course, one of the amazing contradictions of being royalty —the benefits and the restrictions," Athos took another drink of his wine. "And the watchfulness on all sides."

They both fell silent for a long moment, before Athos broke it.

"Come, I've had enough of food, but there are still several bottles of this good red wine for us to share."

Rupert smiled. Not crookedly, or with his head ducked to invite shadows to surround it, but simply smiled.

"Thank you," he said a little huskily, "for your hospitality."

"Oh, get you to the fire," Athos said, disgusted with manners.

"Would —" Rupert curved his neck a little, tilted his head. "There are. I confess I still —would you mind if I —the fruit was —"

How long had it been, Athos wondered, since this man had been given the luxury of choosing from among a plate of fresh fruit, to reach out for a choice berry or crystallized slice, just for the mere pleasure of its taste against his tired palate, just for the burst of sweetness against his teeth; how long had it been since he had allowed himself to fill his mouth with that sharp-sweet rinse of cleansing juice-water, merely at a whim?

Athos gritted his own teeth against the raw and acid-cleaned and somehow _grit-squeaking_ sensation of purging that lined them at the thought and the memory of such times, those times that he had endured himself, in the service of his King, and, rather than show his moment of sick-starved fellow-feeling, moved his shoulders instead to the sand-shift tune of indifference. "Grimaud!" he shouted, and when said avatar of disapprobation appeared, said only, "Wine. Cheese. Fruit. Study."

The silent Grimaud inclined his head, looked upon Rupert with approval, and withdrew.

Rupert blinked after him.

"So. He's used to the tastes you incline to —ah, I mean, I meant, he is accustomed to the —shall we say to the design of your amours, is he?" he asked at last, and now it was Athos's turn to look with true blankness, and comprehend, and, to his own surprise, accept.

"No," he said, and stood, waiting to be joined —and, if he had his way that night, joined in more than one way, with sin and heat and blood and hardness; with yielding and vulgarity and hard nails and musk-smells, a coming together with all that was within them; with all those rough and hidden things that neither of them should even have a fleeting thought toward, and certainly not with each other, after so brief an acquaintance. "Only to discretion."

And the long curls, red-sparked by firelight, moved across broad shoulders, and the lean face with its sweet, surprising cleft chin broke across its own sternness with a smile; a smile which was a little knowing and a little self-mocking; the look of a man who knew the darker kinds of lust a man might have after a battle, and how they could, sometimes, and rarely, be at least partially satisfied; and more rarely still be met upon the level, met by one who felt the same sudden swoop of need, the same drive toward assuagement that would bring the body to a completion that the intellect had already found satisfaction beside; one who knew that this need not be some mere tumble, reeking of gun oil and old blood and sweat, but that might be longer, even be sweeter, driven as it would be by an energy that did not stem from the physical alone, and Athos thought —

_Well. And why not._

It had been a long time in the waiting, his re-entry into this particular fencing circle.

**

Discretion, it seemed, was actually to be the least of his worries that night and the nights that followed. Athos was fit and healthy, in spite of all his years of carousing and nights of drinking that were followed by hangover-free days due only to the fact that he never actually sobered up enough to have a hangover. His lifestyle now, if not what he would consider better or happier, was at least somewhat more wholesome.

But fit or not, he had somehow forgotten that there was a large difference in a man in his forties and a man of twenty-seven. Not in lust, nor even in desire, and certainly not in experience and enjoyment of said experience, but in stamina and refractory time? He was at a sad disadvantage.

There was also the slightly shaming factor that Rupert did not consider any of this either a deterrent nor a hindrance. With energy to spare for three generals, and a natural tendency to view the twenty-four hours of the day as being a movable feast, and sleep something to be snatched at or passed by as the mood took him, he was not even _reliable_ in his timing; he was as likely to leap from Athos's bed to begin scribbling something on a piece of paper that bore more resemblance to alchemy and witchcraft than anything Athos could imagine employing in the field, as he was to fall suddenly and heavily and _inconveniently_ asleep only minutes before Grimaud came into Athos's chambers with a dismally nutritious breakfast.

The first and only time they had successfully woken Rupert (a task of no little effort) he had taken one appalled look at the pot of hot chocolate, damned their eyes for confusing him with a brothel madam, and gone back to sleep.

And somehow, Raoul had heard about it, and kept laughing every time he passed Grimaud in the hallways. Because naturally, everything that this particular exiled prince did or said elevated him only further in the pantheon of Raoul's private gods.

It was all, in short, beginning to piss Athos the fuck off.

Was amazing, absolutely wrecking, exhausting sex worth once again being demoted in his son's eyes? He had, years ago, fallen below the standard of Grimaud and Porthos (when he deigned to visit) and never regained his footing. To be knocked down to fourth place was both irritating and saddening. Well, except for the fact that Rupert was quite sensible about some things, and since Raoul did listen to him, it meant less arguments about duties and studies. Because, of course, Rupert prized both intelligence and knowledge and their use in being a leader. This meant that now, for once, Raoul did the same.

It took Athos longer than it should have, since the symptoms, if not the disease itself, were ones unfamiliar to him, to recognise what drove Rupert's boundless energy and inventive mind. It was not, in fact, the unending appetite for life that Athos had rather easily assumed at first, but rather a burning melancholy —and nothing, not new inventions that tended to explode at unwanted and inopportune moments, not the long rides that even Raoul had been forced to beg off more than once, not even the almost brutally exhilarating moments when he wanted to fuck or be fucked and was equally careless as to which —none of it could assuage what drove this well-named devil, with his burning mind and heart, his fervent and almost febrile devotion to a cause that should not even have been his.

Of course, being no stranger to self-disappointment did nothing towards Athos knowing how to alleviate it. For Athos, his son had done much to correct his attitudes. Raoul had been such a happy child (a sore contrast to the dramatically faked emotions that were currently marking his teenaged years) that it had made Athos, if not a happier man, at least more content.

Still, he could hardly suggest to Rupert that spending more time with his son, bastard or no, would improve his life. Even with as little information as Rupert had given, Athos was well-aware that no man suffering a double exile —the one from a country he hoped never to inherit, the other from the island that should never have had a claim on him —was in any position to offer even the facsimile of a home, or take a boy into his care who was perhaps too young still even to be doing more than learning his letters. No, Rupert's position in the world was too uncertain and too fraught to admit the charge of another soul into his keeping, and the damnable thing was, Athos suspected, he knew it.

There were moments of tenderness —never toward him, of course, and besides, he would have loathed such a showing —but tenderness nevertheless, and to the most unexpected of recipients.

He found Rupert, one day, in the burnt-out shell of a house, amidst the ashed-blond and darkened stubble of fields that should have been devouring earth with their lush greenness.

"But you should move closer in," Rupert was saying earnestly. "You can be housed. Or let the Comte house you, while this disaster rebukes itself by rain and sun. You need not remain amidst desolation, not with a lord who would gladly give you shelter until this rises once more."

"But this is our home," the girl he was talking to said, as though those simple words were more than enough explanation. "My lord, you know as well as I, home is where we should be.”

"But it is..." The heaviness of Rupert's words were as lead, and Athos felt weighed down in his place, chained to the earth by his position and his duty to the land. "Forgive me, but it —it is lost, do you not see? Years. Years will pass, while you —"

"Oh, no! Forgive me, I led you to mistake, no! Look, my lord!" On her knees in the dirt, the girl's bright blue and cold-red harlequined hands scuffed away ash, dug a little deeper and brought up dark-damp soil. And there it was: a flash of green, a stunted sprout that might well be crushed by the impending frost, but still, there and breathing greenness into a too-bright ring of air,that burst upon the tongue like a wine of sparkling Anjou, there it was. A little wandering tendril of hope. "Do you see? All is not lost, as you thought, and pitied me for, and wished to save me from; all is merely beginning, and hope is all around us."

Because there were no other words to offer, Athos extended a promise to them both, with their soil-besmirched hands and their filthy nails, and the way they cupped a yellow-green tendril between them as though it were the last candle of Vespers. "I swear," he vowed roughly, "we will rebuild.”

The girl smiled back at him, and her eyelashes fluttered downward in a promise Athos knew he could take up at any time. "Lord, we always do."

Rupert rode back behind Athos without even a murmur of protest, that evening, and very little dinner was eaten, save Rupert's fruit and Raoul's omnivorous gorging between mouthfuls of oblivious chatter.

Athos was the one to take Rupert that night, with little more than spit and the inevitable gun oil, and the slackening invasion that came from his two-fingered, three-fingered touch, and the slight lubrication of blood, brought unwillingly from old scarred and weakened tissue of a man who knew the costive values of opium. Spit and blood and a little slime, and a little harsh oil to sting and add to it, and ah, there, there, yes, there was that relaxation, even with that painful and tearing and thinly-trickling watery-red liquid that stained so palely upon the thumb's curl where it pressed, there was still that familiar yielding to his touch. And so there it was, that much-desired surrender, that longing to be had, taken, possessed, and Athos had him, and having him and possessing him like any ploughman might a rich soft field, already hoed and hacked and loosened for the delving, so took him where they lay.

Took him on soft sheets and with the grasp of hard bone and harder tendon and muscle, took him and delighted in him, and tried as best he might to memorise those half-breaths and smothered grunts; took the gasps of pain as something more and better than ecstasy; and later rolled them both over, Rupert spent for the first time of what Athos knew (to his chagrin) could be at least four, and his body still glowing and salted fresh-sweat-clean and scented with the desire for _more_.

Athos, thighs clenched tight and shoulders braced to take his weight as he leant back upon his still thick-sinewed arms, Athos rode this long-limbed commander of men; he rode this prince, with his long legs and his broad shoulders, as though this tension of back and muscle and side beneath him were indeed a stallion, and one to be broken to bit and rein and saddle, no less and no more than an undisciplined beast, and no less nor no more mercy to be shown to him; Athos rode him and his wide gaping mouth and his dark eyes, and kissed all that he could reach with a fierce and unforgiving tenderness, until Rupert, still with that half-laugh choking his throat, at last cried out for mercy for himself; Athos rode him beyond what he had even imagined his age-increased stamina would allow him, rode this prince of the Rhine and Bohemia and the Palatinate until he convulsed, until his arms flung outward and curled in and grasping at Athos's sides, at his shoulders; curled in with blunt fingers and nails and marks of purpling demand that would be seen on the morrow; Athos rode this princeling, this _Robert le Diable_ , until he howled out in delighted, painful surrender, and laughed at it all, even as he kissed Athos's lips in return, even as salt water, the kind born of amused and physical and sudden joy, spilt from Rupert's eyes onto his own shoulder, and Athos licked them up in sweet-rimed amusement.

It was, indeed, a delight and a release.

**

But what Rupert of the Rhine actually needed, Athos could see clearly in the cold light of day and sun and black-ended candle-stubs, guttered out in their beautifully-chased silver stems, was a war.

What Athos had absolutely no idea about was how to procure him one where anyone actually wanted him to fight.

So, instead he did what he could to distract him, and in the mean time he send out letters contacting anyone he thought might be useful. Additionally, he spent hours of each day kicking his own arse in the regret that he had ever allowed this damn prince under his roof, into his bed and near his son.

Not because he was a bad influence or a poor guest, but because, somehow, Athos knew that his departure, when it inevitably took place, would leave all of them poorer for it.

"Here is the post, father," Raoul said flatly as he entered the study which Athos had declared a private haven, dumping the few pieces on the desk as if he had just conducted the world's most onerous task.

"All lead-lined, as well, I'm truly impressed," Athos said dryly. Raoul blinked at him. "The weight of them seemed almost too much for you."

Raoul, as expected, scowled. Then, less expectedly, and not altogether pleasantly, smirked. "Grimaud got a letter, too," he said.

"And you, my son, are becoming worse than the town gossip," Athos reproved him. In fact, _Grimaud_ was worse than the town gossip, but since his methods of communication were really only completely known to Athos, there was no way for Raoul to know that, and his statement could not be refuted.

Expecting at least a faint colouring of shame to have silenced his too-nosy offspring, he looked up from his desk to find that instead the smirk had, if possible, deepened in malice aforethought.

He sighed, and closed his eyes. "Go on," he said wearily. "What is it this time?"

"Mousqueton says they've got guests," Raoul said cheerfully.

"How delightful for Mousqueton. We also have guests, or rather a guest, Raoul, should you not be attending on —"

"No, he's making those things out of glass which explode," Raoul explained less than helpfully, "and he says he doesn't want them famous for blinding me before he patents them."

That, Athos thought, seemed reasonable.

"Anyway," Raoul continued, "about Mousqueton —"

"No," Athos said firmly.

"But it's funny —"

"No. Out. Leave. Go and explode his highness's glass —glasses —glass things —those. Go and let his horse in with your mare. Go and give Grimaud swimming lessons, I don't care, just —out."

"Hah, I told him so," Raoul said incomprehensibly, and followed the direction of his father's pointing finger to the door, grinning all the way.

The door closed behind him, and there were a few, blissful seconds of silence before Raoul shouted exuberantly —"Oh, Commander! Father says I can —" and there was the sound of some very thorough cursing in what Athos suspected was Swedish, before another door shut with a bang, and a muffled _crump-p-p-tingt_ noise travelled along the corridor.

Athos rolled his eyes to the heavens.

"Oh God," he said, less than piously, "let me find a war _soon_."

There was another, slightly different and rather loud _crump-psssht_ sound, complete with a concussion that rattled the shutters in their frames and caused Athos to have to make a dive for his inkpot before it slid off the desk and towards the floor.

"Seriously... a skirmish would do as well," Athos continued. "At this point I would almost settle for a barroom brawl... anything."

But, as Athos had often suspected, God, if he still existed at all, did not appear to be listening.

Grimaud, however, had been, and stepped through the door carrying a rather large glass and a bottle of his favourite brandy.

" _Thank you_ ," Athos said fervently.

Grimaud stood there, silently disapproving. Because this, apparently, was how Athos's morning was going to be. Utterly, completely inexplicable, and filled with annoying people and distant explosions.

"Yes?" he asked at last, rather helplessly.

Grimaud put his hand into his jacket, and withdrew a letter, ostentatiously turning over three sheets covered in large and sprawling handwriting, before extracting one and placing it in front of Athos, just where he was about to put his glass down.

"No, really," Athos protested, "why must I be assaulted with your correspondence? I have no desire to —"

Grimaud's finger came down rather pointedly on the lower half of the page, and Athos's eye was drawn to its insistence with the same helpless mesmerization as a bird to a snake's weaving.

Then he actually read it.

_Of course, my master will not be going to fight the Spanish, even if —_

Athos stopped reading, and permitted himself a smile.

"The Spanish," he said, almost cheerfully. "Yes, of course. We're still fighting the Spanish. I'd forgotten."

Grimaud rolled his eyes in a way which managed to convey his thoughts on Athos's intelligence with remarkable succinctness.

"Now all I have to do is get him an introduction to —well. It's been so long. I wouldn't know, any more... "

Grimaud glared at him, snatched up the page of his letter, and marched out of the room in a silence that, for once, seemed less born of obedience and more an extremely pointed comment.

Athos drank his brandy, listened to the distant (and worryingly more crisp) explosions, which appeared now to have moved on from _crumpffffft_ to _cr-ssss-ck_ , and tried to think of anyone left with any sort of influence in Paris that he could still lay claim to knowing.

"D'Artagnan, of course." Athos wilfully ignored the fact that one of his other friends might actually have been more helpful. The lad (and yes, the lad was now in his thirties and no more a lad than Athos, but that was, given the state of things in his once-peaceful house, an incredibly trivial point) would know where to direct him, or, at the very least, would know who would be friendly toward both the Prince and himself. It was a sad thing to have to admit, even in the privacy of his own mind, behind a closed door, that at the moment he needed both.

And he resolutely did not think of a man who would have not only better access to the Queen Regent than the Captain of his Underage Majesty's Musketeers, but almost certainly had unqualified rights of entry to the court of the English Queen, at the Palais St-Germain.

There was, after all, a line of pride which a man could refuse to cross.

Even if all those around him seemed to think that it was bloody stupid.

"Grimaud!" Athos called as he sanded and sealed the letter. "Grimaud!"

His servant appeared, an oddly expectant look on his face. A look that changed to one of complete and utter bafflement when he saw to whom Athos had addressed his letter.

"See that out to the town courier in the morning," Athos said, downing the remainder of his brandy and leaning back in his chair. Soon he'd have some kind of answer and then, he would be less one fidgety, too-tall (too-handsome, too easy to love) princeling and plus a bit of attention from his son... 

Well. Thinking about it like that, no plan was perfect.

"Whoop! Ow! Wonderful! Ow! It went flash as well, that time!" yelled said son exuberantly from somewhere far too close.

Quietly, delicately as a cat moving through spilt water, Athos moved soundlessly toward his study door, and turned the key in the lock.

Whatever was going wonderfully and flashily bang, somewhere in his house, could damn well stay _out_ of his immediate vicinity.

**

Another week passed by, with Athos being pleasurably wrung out at night by his younger lover, and less pleasurably, nor conducive to restful or indeed amatory feelings, being badgered all day by both his son and his wish to find something to keep Rupert occupied. Preferably something that would not involve anything exploding within the confines of his home. Something quiet, like... studying maps. He was certain he had something that would show the Spanish lines well enough for plotting. Or maybe dice... he'd seen games of dicing last for hours, he'd _played_ games of dicing and hazard that lasted for hours, even, one miserable occasion, _days_ , so surely that would be... something that would help time pass?

It seemed not. Rupert diced, and his luck was phenomenal, and yet his purse was so shallow that he refused to pocket any gains he won, saying only 'and if I had been the loser? You would not have accepted it,' which was not exactly something that Athos could refute.

So the days passed, slowly and for the main part (at least as far as Raoul and the estate were concerned) reasonably productively, and Rupert's frenetic energy dimmed a little, and there was still no word back from Paris, even after six days had passed, and Athos began to worry.

Not enough that he had really begun to think of such foolishness as going to Paris himself to find out what disaster D'Artagnan might have become embroiled in this time, but enough to find that his mind wandered between thoughts of his past and thoughts of what he needed for the future, and finding that at some few, strange, inevitable points, the lines of those thoughts crossed and blurred, and he was not always sure that the was concerning himself with the right man, or the right time, or even the right war.

This was all mulling though his mind when his son came into the study and threw his less-than-tidy self down on a couch, "I don't understand you, father."

"Regarding what?" Athos asked, "Or are you attempting to be just enigmatic enough so that I don't understand you either?"

In obedience with the rules of being a teenaged boy, Raoul simply rolled his eyes before he continued, "Why are you trying to get his highness to leave? You like having him here, I can tell."

"And why do you think I'm trying to get him to leave?" Athos knew all of the reasons that Rupert could not stay, but wanted to test his son's insight.

"You've written to Monsieur d'Artagnan," Raoul answered, as if that were all the explanation needed.

Athos really did not see the corollary, but he admired his son's ability to take two completely unconnected facts (or rather, facts which should have been unconnected as far as _he_ was concerned) and make them into a statement of purpose with which he could then moodily disagree.

It was rather impressive.

"I have indeed written to the Captain of the Musketeers," he said blandly, "but why you should assume —"

Raoul rolled his eyes in a way that Athos just _knew_ he had picked up from Grimaud. It managed to combine a sort of knowing despair and smug judgement in a way that no fourteen year old should have been capable of mustering.

"Because otherwise," Raoul said with the patience normally employed when talking to the deaf, the old, or the slow-witted, "you wouldn't be bothering. You think writing letters to friends is _gossiping_ ," he added bitterly, which reminded Athos of just why he never let himself have opinions where Raoul could overhear them, since they always came back to insert their teeth directly into the root of his argument, and render it recumbent, dead, and therefore completely useless.

"I could hardly write to the Captain of the Musketeers regarding cattle breeding and my son's latest obsession with attempting to blow up our home, now could I?" Athos huffed. "So, of course, you are correct: my letter must have been regarding Prince Rupert."

Apparently Raoul had no understanding of sarcasm, or he would not have agreed so readily, "Exactly. And that's what I don't understand. Are you trying to get the Prince to leave?"

"No," Athos tried first, then shrugged his shoulders. "Or yes, because he cannot be happy here, in exile. He needs something to do that more befits his skills."

"Oh," Raoul said, and then, right on cue and as though prompted, "Can I go with him?"

" _No,_ " said Athos, who knew his own lines quite well without need for such mental prompting. 

"But if it's a war—"

"It's a war which has been going on for over twenty years," Athos said grimly, "and while I suspect the Prince's participation will make something of a difference, I know very well that yours will not. Besides, I do not know any of the Marshals well enough to hate them."

"What?"

"If I did," Athos continued imperturbably, "I would of course recommend you to the one I disliked most. Personally. As an aide-de camp. Making sure his life ran smoothly."

Raoul's glare was impressive. It practically contained bared teeth and glowing eyes.

Athos raised an eyebrow in return.

Raoul, for the one thousandth time that week, stormed out of the room, and slammed the door shut behind him.

Athos, safe behind still-shaking wood, allowed himself to grin at the panelling, his self-assigned duty for the day (and in fact every day) that of scoring at least one point against his son in the endless battle of Stating The Obvious As Sarcastically As Possible, quite thoroughly accomplished.

**

The post, when it finally arrived, was both more and less than Athos expected. It included letters from both Porthos —

 _Definitely gossip,_ Athos thought, and tucked the letter away for his later, private, amusement—

— and one from d'Artagnan, which he opened immediately.

The letter was overly long and wordy, much like d'Artagnan himself could be when left to his own devices for too long, and amounted to a tirade about the cost of maintaining the Musketeers and a confused query as to why Athos thought that he would have contacts that would be of any use to Robert le Diable for Christ's sake. But d'Artagnan also said he had spoken to someone who would be of more help.

That explained the final letter, tucked inside the one from d'Artagnan. It was addressed, not to himself, but to Rupert, in a tidy but flourishing hand that seemed, somehow, familiar.

It was not sealed, as though the writer did not wish to reveal even as much of himself as some personalised sigil might convey, or perhaps as though whoever it was thought that open invitations to read a message clearly addressed to another were a greater security than any waxed-and-ribboned suggestion or threat that all but the intended recipient should keep out.

It was at once a demand of honour and a carefully suggested demonstration of power, implying as it did that no-one would be foolish enough not to assume that the writer would, somehow, _know_ if his correspondence was intercepted.

Had he not been safely in his tomb these last four years and more, Athos might have suspected that this came from Richelieu's hand —despite D'Artagnan's periodic bouts of public enmity with the man, they had shared a pragmatism and more common goals than might have been expected at the time of their first meetings of mutual frustration. And to have one of the Palatine princes owing him a favour was certainly something Athos would have expected the former Cardinal to be delighted by.

But no. Richelieu was dead, and the man who had come after him, the Italian Mazarin, had a different method of obtaining loyalty, and one which was almost certainly not based upon the implied respect granted to his name and position.

Unwilling to break the almost insouciantly-offered confidence by unfolding the missive, therefore, and no less curious as to its contents than the identity of the writer, Athos went in search of his guest, and hoped to find both questions answered with less confusion than the simply-folded letter had awoken in his usually tranquil mind.

"Eyes up... left foot... left foot... turn... step together... and bow... No, keep your eyes up even in the bow." 

It was a strange litany that Athos heard as he entered the sitting room. All of the furniture had been moved to the sides of the room and Rupert and Raoul stood in the middle of the resultant chaos. Rupert held a broad leaf in one hand as if it were a fan and had a two cushions and a table cloth tied at his waist. He was making the daintiest curtsey that could be expected of a man of his height and simpering at Raoul in way that Athos, please God, hoped never to see directed to his son by an actual female.

"And that, my son, is no doubt how the English have become renowned for their lack of grace," Athos said dryly.

Surprisingly, Raoul looked more embarrassed to see him than Rupert did, colouring up and stammering some sort of excuse, while Rupert only laughed and fluttered his leaf with a surprisingly precise mimicry of some of the gestures Athos, too, had learnt —and, in his younger days, before he was even married or considered such a step, taken advantage of.

"Behave," he said to Rupert, unable to quite disguise his amusement, and received a wholly natural little grin in response, no coyness or flirtatious flummery to his looks. "And this is in aid of —?"

"I was explaining that one of the deadliest battlefields a soldier ever faces is the court's dance floors," Rupert said. "The number of poor cadets I have seen become the evening's entertainment through no fault of their own, but rather through an expectation that an over-zealous polishing of their boots to match an overly-polished floor will be the perfect way to impress some poor partner —it's truly humbling, I tell you."

Athos laughed, thinking of D'Artagnan's first attempts at courtly behaviour, and his subsequent despair at ever learning the art of even avoiding general mirth, let alone conveying familiarity with ordinary politeness.

He seemed to remember that it was Porthos who had undertaken the young Gascon's instruction, back then, and if his recollections were correct, they had made just as ill-assorted a pair —and Porthos a surprisingly thorough and patient tutor.

Athos had confined himself to drinking, watching, and making unhelpful remarks, during that period. He felt it would be the preferable option this time, as well.

"Letters have arrived," he said, instead of enquiring further, "and one for you, your highness." He raised his eyebrows, and added pointedly —" _Unsealed._ "

Rupert, as familiar with politics and machinations as any other prince of Europe, pursed his lips in a silent whistle. "Oh-ho. Well, I've gained myself _some_ interest, then."

"A letter from who?" Raoul asked. His voice and expression seemed equal in gratitude that the subject had been changed.

"Someone," Athos said, "obviously. And no business of yours. As a matter of fact, I do believe I saw your tutor looking for you when I came in."

It was a very pointed comment, but the boy still looked hopefully toward Rupert for a contradiction. Alas for him, the Prince was well involved in the letter he had received, so at his father's further gesture he left the room, closing the door somewhat more firmly than was absolutely necessary.

"A letter of introduction," Rupert said at last. "Well, this should get me through the disapproval waiting for me at the English Queen's residence at St Germain. First to de Retz, whom even I know to be a supporter of the King's cause, and from de Retz, it is hoped, to the Marshal de Gassion, whom this writer does not know, but considers to be 'a man equal to yourself in all things, including that entrenched conviction in the rights of man which has caused you to be well-known, if not always well-regarded, in the armies and warring courts of that beleaguered and suffering island which so recently termed you banished.' Banished," Rupert repeated musingly. "It is so much less romantic and so much more accurate than that little ballad-word 'exiled', don't you think? And to use it to me as a warning that Queen Henrietta Maria will not be as — _pleased_ —to greet me as courtesy should dictate —hah." He laughed a little, smiling down at the papers in his hand. "I think this Abbé must be less pious and more —politically adept, let us say —than his title would suggest."

"Abbé?" Athos asked, quite calmly, even if he did not feel it. I had been so long since he'd heard from the man, even indirectly. "Of course, it would be. He always was... rather savvy, and he was once a Musketeer."

"Oh?" Rupert raised a questioning eyebrow.

"Long ago," Athos shrugged it off. "I'm glad he could help you."

"And I am glad you wrote letters." Rupert grinned.

"Letters?" Athos scoffed. "I merely exchanged idle gossip with a friend. He was the one to take it further."

"The friend, or the Abbé?" Rupert asked, and laughed off any response before Athos could think of one to make. "No, your past is your own, I am grateful you allowed yourself so much recollecting of it as to find me help. And I am, truly, grateful for this. To be reduced to no more than a mercenary, seeking employment by any side, no matter what the cause —it is degrading, and you have spared me that. Besides," he added, "fighting the Spanish will be a pleasure, whereas fighting the Dutch at this point might well prove a source of embarrassment very soon."

"The League," Athos said, agreeing.

"And my father's many revolutions in his grave, yes," Rupert agreed, untying cushions and cloth from around his waist. "But also —there is talk as to the older princes, in particular the young lion of Wales who has so impressed your son, being —well, to be blunt, being _sent_ to the Hague. Were his cousin to be found on some field opposing them, it might make his hypothetical future problematic."

"His own, or his cousin's?" Athos asked dryly, returning Rupert's little grammatical quibble to him with style.

Rupert only smiled. "Does it matter?"

And Athos realised that for Rupert, his loyalty was such that it did not matter at all, for it was one and the same.

There had been three men, once, for whom he would have done and said much more, in the name of that same loyalty.

"No," he replied simply. "I think not."

**

The preparations for the Prince's departure took more time than expected and, if he were honest, less time than Athos would have liked. Defecting son and sleepless nights and explosions aside, he was going to miss the man far more than he had any right to and for longer than was sensible. It was a sentiment that Athos had grown mature enough to admit to, even if he couldn't admit it of other, longer absences. 

"Really, Monsieur le Comte, it is too much," Rupert argued, for what was probably the tenth time in half as many days. 

"Stop," Athos commanded, as he watched Grimaud load the last of Rupert's luggage onto his own coach for the journey. "You can't arrive at court on horseback with just the clothes on your back. Besides, Raoul would never forgive me if I didn't send you off in style."

"Raoul is never going to forgive _me_ ," Rupert pointed out, "first for leaving at all and secondly for refusing to take him."

"I warned you he would ask," Athos pointed out.

"I did not need warning," Rupert said with a faintly sly smile. "My own brother will no doubt be waiting for me on the battlefield, demanding to know 'what took you so long?' and having somehow sequestered the best tent for himself and his personal usage, leaving any Marshals worth the name out in the cold and the wet. If I had been so foolish as to even confess that I would have liked to take Raoul as my cadet, I would have found him there with Maurice, both of them set to scold me for my dallying." The faint slyness of the smile broke into a real one of pure amusement. "And I would then have to confess that it was not dallying, indeed, but dalliance, and what would you have to say to such calumny, Comte?"

"Why, nothing but lies, slander and perjury, naturally," Athos said. "And most especially the last, while I took great pleasure in lying to God's face of judgement on earth."

"Hah!"

He would miss that crack of unholy, gleeful laughter, Athos knew; miss it more even than he would come to miss the pleasure he had found in his bed once again, and the memory of warmth that he had become accustomed to reaching towards.

The sound of the Palatine, the devil on earth, shouting for pure delight with the world and all he found in it; the sound of the first crack of a shot at dawn that meant the beginning of a soldier's freedom; the sound of youth and strength and bravery let loose upon the battlefields of Europe.

Athos could not insult this man by lying to his face with convention, and telling him that prayers went with him. He could only wish him well, and send him away with the best of what thoughts he could ever spare that were not Raoul's for the asking; the best of his own youth and the last remnants of a young man's joy that he must now relinquish, together with the knowledge of the man he might well have been, had the woman then calling herself Charlotte Backson, and the brand of the fleur-de-lys she had tried to hide from him, not stolen him away instead, away into a world that for a very long time had consisted of no more than lost hope and bitterness. 

It was a strange farewell, to be sure, but Athos felt that it was less a parting than the ending of a caesura, the closing of a shutter on the sweet air of an evening's last light.

"I will write to you." Rupert said as he stepped up into the coach. "All the gossip you will pretend to hate. I'll hope that you will deign to respond occasionally, if only about Raoul and your health."

Athos nodded. Perhaps it was time to put such restrictions aside, time to look back on life and friendship and remember the value of them both. Porthos's letter still rested in his pocket, unread due to the hectic days that had followed its arrival. Perhaps that would be the place to begin.

Porthos would probably think that he'd contracted some life-ending malady.

Athos found himself looking forward to it —and even more to the letters that Grimaud and Mousqueton would undoubtedly exchange, and Raoul's attempts to tell him about what was suspected of his mental and physical state.

A steady life, he had found, could hide within it bright little concealed delights, like the green sprig beneath the dirt and ash of the ruined fields.

"I might lower myself that much," he agreed. "Farewell."

"God be with you," Rupert answered, and disappeared into the shadows of the coach as it set off.

And Athos, smiling to himself, went to find out what form Raoul's fit of the sulks had taken for the day.

He was almost hoping it turned out to be the explosions. They had seemed, after all, rather intriguing.


End file.
